It is widely acknowledged that patients are moved and mobilized in order to optimize their recovery from illness, yet a sedentary model of care dominates our acute care system. Care is bed-based, and most patients are permitted or even encouraged to remain in bed well beyond the time where various forms of deterioration—known as “immobility-related adverse events”—begin to set in.
The need for supporting, lifting, moving, mobilizing, ambulating, and rehabilitating patients can cause musculo-skeletal injury to caregivers. This is because patient support platforms such as beds, chairs, and toilets typically provide no assistance in a patient getting into/onto or out of/off them. To protect workers and lower workmen's compensation costs associated with caregiver musculo-skeletal injury, many institutions have a “no-lift” policy and obtain equipment to assisting the lifting and mobilization of patients. However, compliance of caregivers with the policy can be low due to the inconvenience of using available equipment, essentially all of which has been developed with a materials-handling mentality of moving an object from one location to another but without the goal of sustaining a patient upright or mobilizing patients on a continuing basis. And because they are single-purpose items, they are stored elsewhere and have to be retrieved for use rather than remaining in-room and on-hand as a room furnishing by virtue of their continuing multi-functionality. In addition, both chairs and beds do not assist debilitated patients in remaining upright and out of bed, so patients are driven back to sedentary in-bed postures. So while the physical rehabilitation process should begin and continue in the patient room, it usually does not, for lack of appropriately designed and conceived on-hand equipment.
Inability to easily mobilize a patient or to support a patient in an upright posture is also present in the home environment. To minimize the cost of care and lessen exposure to infection, patient stays in hospitals and nursing homes are being shortened, resulting in an increasing portion of a patient's recovery taking place in a home environment under the care of care partners (i.e. family, friends, or hired help). However, suitable equipment for mobilizing a patient in the home is also lacking.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for a better system to support, move, and mobilize patients.